Gale's Flower
by MaddieMozart
Summary: This is a Gale and Posy story, big brother and little sister love. Slight Gale/Prim.
1. Chapter 1

**Hi! Just so you know, I LOVE Gale and Posy stories, so I made one up! I hope you like it! This is during the 74th Hunger Games. **

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"Gale? What's wrong?" I didn't answer the little girl, only buried my head in my hands. I fought the tears. I felt a small hand on my shoulder.

"Why are you crying?" the little girl asked, crouching down on the ground so that she could look up at me. Her eyes, Seam grey with streaks of blue, like mine, held question and concern. I knew that she didn't understand what could have upset me this much. I didn't let my emotions show. The little girl hadn't so much as seen me cry.

"I'm not crying," I told her. I was proud that I wasn't. I couldn't let her see me showing vulnerability. Not now, when she needed me so much.

"You would have if I hadn't come out here," she said, gently but matter-of-factly. A shot of anger ran through me.

"I would not have, Posy. Now get inside." She had backed away at my outburst, and I was suddenly aware of how harsh my voice had sounded, even to me. I gentled, overcome by sadness and fatigue. "I'm sorry, Posy," I apologized. "I didn't mean to be angry at you. Forgive me?" She ran over and wrapped her arms about my waist.

"_Always_."

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"Gale. Gale!" I was being shaken awake by my mother, Hazelle, who had a worried expression on her face. My brow knit in concern.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"It's Posy. She's asleep, but she's calling for you, and I'm afraid she's having another nightmare." _Another? _I thought. _I wasn't aware she was having any_. I got out of bed, fully dressed because I had just fallen asleep without changing, and went from my bedroom, which I shared with my younger brothers, Rory and Vick, to my mother's room, where Posy's bed was. She was tossing and turning, the calm, peaceful expression that she assumed while she slept changed to one of fear. I went to her, calling her name and stroking her blonde hair that was damp with sweat.

"Posy! Posy, wake up. It's Gale." Her eyes opened, searching for something to land their gaze upon. When she found me, she started to sob and threw her arms around my neck.

"Keep them away, Gale! Please!" she cried. I searched my mind and replayed last night's Hunger Games events to see what could have gotten her so upset.

"Keep what away, Posy?" I asked, holding her shaking form.

"The – the tracker jackers." She cringed at the memory the name brought her and cowered closer to my chest.

"What are you talking about?" I asked. I didn't remember any tracker-jackers in yesterday's viewing.

"It was when you were hunting yesterday," mother said. "I'm sorry I didn't think to tell you." I looked back at Posy.

"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked. She looked up sheepishly.

"Well... I-I forgot, that's all," she stammered. I could tell that either she wasn't telling me the whole truth or just flat-out lying to me, something I couldn't comprehend, because in Posy's mind, truth was always of the utmost importance, and she had always been matter-of-fact in a sweet and loving way. So why wasn't she telling me the truth this time?

"Ok," I said. "But if something happens like that again, you tell me as soon as I get home, alright?" She nodded.

"Good," I said, getting up. "Now, I have to go. Are you going to be ok?"

"Are you going to hunt?" mother asked. Before I could answer her, Posy was on her feet.

"Oh, please, Gale, pretty please can I go with you?" I sighed. Posy would scare off game and get my balance off-kilter, but I got a good haul yesterday.

"If mom says so," I said. Posy looked up at mom, who, knowing I had probably weighed the pros against the cons, gave her consent. I frowned at Posy in mock sternness.

"You better get dressed and ready, little girl, if you want to leave with me." She jumped off the bed and she and mother got her ready as I left the room to get my game back and jacket from the kitchen.

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**End of Chapter 1. Should I continue? Please review!**


	2. Chapter 2

When she came out, she was dressed in an outfit of a green shirt and brown pants with brown knee-high boots, her hair done up in pigtails, a look that totally mirrored me at her age. Well, but more girly, of course.

"Come on," I said, taking her hand. "Let's go." We walked out into the early morning sun that bathed the Seam with its warmth. That was the kind of morning Katniss would have loved. We walked out towards the edges of the Seam, where Katniss's house was. I could see that Mrs. Everdeen was hanging the wash and that Prim was sitting in the grass, playing with Buttercup, her cat, in the sunshine. When she looked up and saw us, she rose from her place.

"Gale!" she called.

Prim was pretty. I wouldn't deny it in a million years. With her long, blonde locks and unusual Merchant's blue eyes, she didn't fit in with the Seam, a people of dark hair and grey eyes. Neither did her mother, who used to be one of the Merchant Class until she married Mr. Everdeen. Posy was like them, though I don't know how the Merchant Class wove its way into the Hawthorne bloodline. Posy was fair skinned, blue-eyed, and blonde too.

But Prim was only 14, and I didn't know if she even liked me anyways. So, I pushed the thought from my head and greeted her.

"Good morning, Prim," I said.

"Hi Prim!" Posy said, flashing an adorable smile.

"Hey guys," Prim said. "You out to hunt?" Posy nodded.

"Gale said I could come with him today." Prim smiled at Posy.

"Well, you two better get a move on if you want to catch something," she said, shoving me gently to get me moving.

"Bye, Prim," I said with a quiet laugh.

"Bye, Gale," she said, smiling. "Bye, Posy."

"Bye, Prim!" Posy said, her usual energetic self.

We walked until we came to the chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. I felt the familiar ground under my feet, which had shaped itself to mine and Katniss's footprints. I stopped for a moment, listened for the telltale hum of electricity on the fence, and heard nothing. I slipped through the gap in the metal, holding my hand out to Posy when I was on the other side. She ducked under the gap, small as she was. Once she was under, we moved quickly and quietly to the woods. Once we were decently far in, I took a deep breath of the fresh, free air and let myself open up to my beloved woods.

"You love it here, don't you?" Posy asked, watching me. "You're smiling, Gale. For real." I smiled to myself at her innocent observation and obvious happiness. "It makes it feel better, Gale," she said, putting a small hand over her chest. "It makes daddy not hurt as much when you're happy." My heart nearly broke in two. My baby sister had just told me that when I was happy, it lessened the pain she felt at our father's death. I smiled sadly.

"Thank you, Posy. I'm glad."

While I was hunting, to my surprise, Posy didn't talk. She just quietly observed me, asking questions here and there about what kind of bird was singing, were we going to see and deer, and how did I shoot so straight. As the sun neared noon, I realized that she was getting quieter. Looking behind me to her, I saw that she was very tired, and that she was fighting her body's demands for sleep. I smiled to myself.

"Come here, Posy," I said, sitting with my back against an oak tree near the lake. Amazingly, Posy had trekked with me up to the lake that Katniss and I used to fish at. It's a fairly long hike, but Posy stayed with me till the end, when she finally tuckered out. She came over to me and sat in my lap, leaning her head back on my chest, letting the sun warm her skin and the breeze cool her cheeks. I could tell by her breathing that she was asleep within minutes. Sleep sounded appealing to me as well, so I let myself feel safe for the first time in a long time and succumbed to sleep, my little sister asleep against me and the summer breeze on my skin.

I don't know what woke me. It might have been the footsteps, but they would have been too far away to have woken me. Then again, I was a light sleeper these days.

I realized that it was instinct. A natural hunter's intuition that made me react to the proximity of prey or predator. I didn't know what it was, only that we had to move.

"Posy," I said quietly, gently waking her. Her eyes fluttered open and she looked at me. Her expression turned quizzical.

"What's the matter, Gale?" she asked.

"We need to get back," I said, trying to keep my expression as calm as possible. I don't know why I was having a paranoia attack about something I wasn't completely sure wasn't a rabbit, but I was, and I didn't need to get Posy in a state, too. We took a different path back from the lake, leaving a wide perimeter between us and our original path.

We were about a mile or so away from the edge of the woods when I heard them.

"Come here, Posy, and be absolutely silent." I ducked behind some boulders that were overgrown with years' worth of ivy and overgrowth. I held Posy close to me, and I had my hand gently over her mouth to make sure she didn't say anything. The footsteps were alarming in their proximity, and I detected the unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked.

"Delta Base, this is Squad 151. We have reached sector 607. Repeat mission," came a gruff voice.

"Squad 151, your mission was to track down and arrest illegal poacher Gale Hawthorne. Our intelligence says he is in sector 607," said a woman's voice, riddled with static.

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**There's Chapter 2! Please review! Thank you to all that reviewed or just read! You made my day!**


	3. Chapter 3

"Bring him back - alive. Kill any accomplices. I only want him."

My heart rate must have doubled. I tightened my grip around Posy, my mind whirling with plans for escape, plans to somehow sacrifice myself and keep Posy out of harm's way. It hadn't even fully hit me yet - they had said to_ kill_ any accomplices._ Kill_ Posy.

_No._

Footsteps came closer. I realized that there were more than just one looking for me. How badly was I outnumbered? I could take down two guys, maybe three, but they had guns and I didn't - this significantly slimmed my chances. But that didn't matter.

The boulder had some sort of animal's den beneath it, hollowed out. Since it was summer, the occupants would have likely found a new home since last winter, when it was most likely dug. A plan started to form in my head, one based off of luck and probability, but it was the best I had. I had to move fast, though.

I leaned as close as I could to Posy, and whispered as quietly as was humanly possible:

"_Absolutely silent. Do not move. Stay hidden until you can't hear us. Then go home_."

She nodded. And then it happened.

I twisted my torso, placing my sister roughly but effectively in the burrow, hidden from sight. She did as she was told, not moving, staying silent. The movement alerted the Peacekeepers, and shouts of "over here!" and "get him!" echoed through the company. They came after me, guns cocked and ready. But I had to get them away from Posy.

I broke out into a run, skidding down the slope of the mountain, branches cutting my face. They followed closely after me, their shouts loud and angry. I kept them up to the chase, but we were still dangerously close to Posy.

I'm a healthy, in-shape guy. I hunt and run and stuff like that on a regular basis. But I wasn't a match for trained professionals on Capitol steroids. They tackled me, threw me to the ground, shackled me, tazed me. Electricity shot through my body and light exploded across my vision. I yelled, unable to move, but able to feel. _So this is what death is like_.

Only one thing could have brought me back. And it did. And it killed me as much as it saved me.

A tiny cry, a whimper of need, a vocal embodiment of love.

"_Gale_!_"_

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**I'm baaaack! Do you guys like this installment? **


	4. Chapter 4

_"Oh, thank god you're home. We were beginning to get worried." I shrugged my sodden jacket off and hung it up, careful not to get the rest of the floor wet. I smiled slightly at my mother to reassure her._

_"Yeah, it got a little stormy on the way back. Had to go around some flooding." She nodded, a look of worry still creasing her features. _

_"What's wrong, mom?" I asked. "I'm back. Don't worry." She sighed._

_"I'm not worried about you, now that you're home," she said. "It's your sister."_

_"What's wrong with her?" I asked, already worried. "Is she sick?"_

_"No, she's just frightened of the storm," my mother said. I let out a breath that I hadn't realized I'd been holding. The corners of my lips quirked up in a smile._

_"If that's all, then I'll get her to sleep," I said. My mother relaxed visibly._

_"Thank you, Gale. I didn't want to ask you, after you'd been out all day - "_

_"It's fine mom, really," I said, kissing her on the cheek and moving towards Posy's bedroom. "Not a problem."_

_I opened the door to my mother's bedroom, which she shared with Posy. I noticed that she was under a pile of blankets on the bed, and I smiled again as I sat down on the side of the bed._

_"You don't have to be scared of the thunder, little girl."_

_She jumped out from under the covers, a smile of relief on her pixie face. I noticed tear streaks on her cheeks._

_"Gale!" she said. "You're back!" She threw her arms around my neck and I held her close as the next wave of thunder rolled though. She trembled._

_"Don't be scared, Po," I said soothingly. "The giants won't hurt us, I promise." She looked up, eyes sparkling in wonderment._

_"Giants?" he asked in awe._

_"Yeah, but they're really nice," I said, fabricating a fairy tale for her. Posy loved fairy tales._

_I shifted so that I was laying on my back on the bed and she was laying on my chest._

_"Tell me about the giants, Gale," she said. "Pretty please?" I laughed._

_"Sure, Po." I started to stroke her long, blonde hair, and I could feel her relax. "There's a bunch of giants, and they live up in the sky. When it thunders, they're just moving their furniture around."_

_"Like mommy does sometimes? Like the couch?"_

_"Yeah, just like that. And when there's lightning, d'you know what that means?"_

_"No. What is it?"_

_"It means that they're turning on their lamps."_

_"Really?"_

_"Yeah, really. So don't be scared of it. It's not scary, I promise."_

_"Are you sure?"_

_"I'm sure." Lightning flashed and thunder rolled. _

_"But Gale -"_

_"Hey, I'm right here. I won't let anything hurt you Po, I promise."_


End file.
